Thanks to the member from Brampton. It’s great to get a question that is tough but fair from him this morning.

Unlike the NDP and the Liberal caucus and the queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, we’re against a carbon tax in Ontario. The greens, the reds, the oranges—they’re in favour of a carbon tax.

As families are getting out on the road this summer, maybe the Liberals will be getting into their minivan and travel to southwestern Ontario to visit their members—oh, hold on, they don’t have any members in southwestern Ontario, so they won’t be going to visit their members. But it’s going to cost them a lot more to fuel up that minivan.

Families are fuelling up their minivans; it’s going to cost them more. Energy costs, gasoline costs, groceries—it’s all going up.

The Premier Ford team here in Ontario is making life more affordable for the people of Ontario—cutting taxes, cutting fees, cutting tolls, cutting the carbon tax.

We do have a plan, Powering Ontario’s Growth, and seeing the types of investment that the Minister of Economic Development and the Premier were at yesterday in the Niagara region—multi-billion dollar investments are coming back. It’s because we’re cutting the costs of doing business and making life more affordable for the people of Ontario.

While the queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, is in full support of the federal carbon tax, we are not.

I know we’ve got some good folks here from rural Ontario who are going to the pumps every day. We’ve got some beef farmers here from Grey county as well, and the cost of them doing business is going up billions of dollars over time because of the increased carbon tax. It’s only going to continue to keep going up and up and up.

We’re making life more affordable. I know the member from Brampton really loves the One Fare program that’s been brought in for transit riders. It’s going to cut the cost by $1,600 a year. We’ve cut the gas tax, 10.7 cents a litre, making life more affordable. Cutting licence plate sticker fees, cutting taxes—

Interjection.

Thanks very much to the member opposite from Brampton for the great question this morning.

Our government knows that a reliable and affordable electricity grid isn’t just good for the economy; it’s also great for the environment.

We’ve stabilized electricity prices since the harmful days of the previous Liberal government, through programs like the comprehensive electricity plan, which has stabilized rates. It has allowed manufacturing jobs and new investment to come back to our province, like the $3.6-billion investment at Stellantis in the member opposite’s riding and down in the Windsor region as well—but it’s more than just that. Stabilizing our electricity rates also means that companies can now invest in electrifying their industrial businesses, like we’re seeing with the green steelmaking processes coming soon to Hamilton and Sault Ste. Marie.

It’s because of a stable, reliable, affordable electricity grid that we will see reduced emissions in other parts of our economy, while at the same time watching our economy in this province grow.

The comprehensive electricity plan is reducing electricity costs for more than 50,000 industrial and commercial customers by 15% to 17%. To the member’s question: Why is that program necessary? Well, I can tell you, it’s necessary because of a decade of Liberals mucking up the energy policy in our province. They signed contracts under the Green Energy Act, locked in for 20 years, many at 80 cents a kilowatt hour, when our clean, reliable, affordable nuclear power was available for eight cents a kilowatt hour and our hydroelectric was available for four cents a kilowatt hour. The Liberals kept signing these contracts that were driving up the price of electricity and were going to continue to drive up the price of electricity by 6%, 7%, 8% year over year, through the end of the decade. The comprehensive energy plan is meant to fix the problems that were created by the Liberal government.

We are bringing back a stable electricity system to our province so that our economy can thrive.